


Hell is Empty

by spinner33



Series: CM - AU [8]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: M/M, Self-Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-23
Updated: 2015-10-23
Packaged: 2018-04-27 17:33:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5057572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spinner33/pseuds/spinner33
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for Hotch Hearts Reid Prompt - Self-sacrifice to save other from harm.</p><p>Hotch and Reid are at the mercy of an unsub.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hell is Empty

**Author's Note:**

> Very graphic depictions of rape and violence. So not kidding.

Hell is empty, and all the devils are here -- William Shakespeare

 

“So this is good for you? Does it turn you on?”

Hotch couldn’t tear his eyes away, couldn’t respond, couldn’t utter anything except for a low moan of sympathetic pain. Reid’s face was a mask of anguish. He was biting his mouth closed to keep from screaming out as the unsub (who the fuck was this guy?) slammed deep inside him, deep between his spread legs. Reid’s head was resting against Hotch’s thighs, so Aaron could feel every push, every shudder, every cry that Reid suppressed. He wanted to reach down and stroke Spencer’s face, wanted to soothe the pain away, but the shackles on his wrists prevented such simple tenderness. The fact that his wrists were attached to the cold stone wall above his head and behind him did not keep Hotch from shaking those bindings until his wrists were raw and bloody.

The only thing that was keeping Hotch from totally losing his mind was the hope that his team was going to find them. The team would find the leads that Reid had tacked up on the board, and they would follow the same path to this hidden lair, this filthy basement filled with slats of wood and bends of rusty pipe, this lair that smelled like Death and Pain had set up house here and been very happy for many years. The team would be here, soon. They would be here soon. Hotch clung to that hope as surely it was the only thing he had left to cling to.

“Why so quiet, Pretty Baby? Why so quiet? Don’t you like it? Doesn’t this turn you on? I know you like it rough,” the unsub was crooning to Reid. Spencer’s glazed eyes looked away, looked anywhere else but at the man on top of him. _You don’t exist if I don’t look at you._ Hotch knew what was going through Reid’s mind as his arms coiled up, fingers pressed backwards to his mouth to stifle his cries.

The unsub drew up and raised one fist. He backhanded Reid hard to one side and then the other and then back again. A trickle of blood traced down Spencer’s chin, down his neck. He was wearing his tie and his shirt, but his trousers and boxers were gone. His bare legs and feet were scratched and bleeding already from the nails that littered the floor. It was like half of Reid was in this hell and the other half was elsewhere.

“Scream for me, Pretty Baby….” the unsub hissed, thrusting over and over. “You know you want to. Scream for me. Scream for me.”

Spencer lolled his head back between Hotch’s knees, and screamed for all he was worth. He took a deep breath, and gave another scream. The unsub was suddenly all smiles. Reid took another deep breath, paused for a little shudder, and then began to laugh, mocking, loud, breathless, frantic. Part of Hotch’s heart died at that horrible sound.

It was the unsub’s turn to shudder and lose face as his features went blank with uncertainty. He fumbled back from Reid, his body red with Spencer’s blood, his clothes rumpled, and his knees dirty from the floor where he had been rutting like an animal against the prostrate and defenseless man.

Reid took another deep breath, burying his face in Hotch’s strong thighs, and sobbed uncontrollably. As the unsub continued to back away, going limp with self-doubt, Reid balled up between Hotch’s legs, drew his naked lower half up towards his body, clinging to Hotch’s chest, hiding his face in Aaron’s neck and whimpering.

The unsub regained his composure, fueled by hatred and anger. He took a half-step closer and reached out a hand at Reid. Spencer screamed desperately and clung to Hotch with both arms. The unsub grabbed Reid’s wrists, dragging him bodily from the safety of Hotch’s lap.

“No….no…please….” Aaron begged.

Spencer was kicking and screaming, flailing, connecting one foot, then the other, but his struggles only seemed to reassure his attacker. The unsub pinned Reid against the dirt floor once more, forcing his legs apart. Spencer was sobbing pitifully. Hotch had reached his breaking point.

“Me,” Aaron said. “Please. Me. I can scream. I can scream loud. I’ll scream all you want. Please stop. Please stop,” Hotch babbled. “Don’t hurt him any more. Stop hurting him. Please stop.”

As Reid wailed in pain, his hands scrambled backwards, clawed at the stone wall, clawed at the floor, wishing, wanting, hoping for any shard or piece or ghost of a weapon. There was debris everywhere, bent and broken nails, shards of wood and glass. That wouldn't be enough though. Surely he could luck into a pipe or part of a board. The unsub wobbled off-balance as Reid jerked to one side, jerked to the other, jerked backwards, scratched his head on the unforgiving wall. The unsub slapped Reid hard, and Spencer’s eyes crossed. He breathed out, and slumped back against the wall. 

“Please…..” Aaron begged. “Please. Me.”

The unsub didn’t seem to know quite what to do. He stared at Reid’s silent form as the doctor slid down the wall to the floor sideways, leaving a bloody trail from the knock to the back of the head. Hotch could see Reid was breathing, shallow and quick. He was temporarily unconscious. All the better. Maybe he wouldn’t see what was about to come.

“Me…..I can….I can scream….” Hotch promised.

The unsub turned slowly to where Hotch was, slipping out of his jeans, scrambling forward. His deviant leer returned as he summed Hotch up with appreciative eyes. Aaron held still, biting his mouth, letting the tears welling in his eyes fall down his face. He kept his eyes locked on the unsub’s hollow black soulless eyes. Hotch had stared Death in the eyes before. This man’s aura of evil paled in comparison to that which had emanated off of Foyet. This man didn’t scare Hotch as much as he wished he could have scared him.

“You can scream for me?” the unsub whispered, licking his lips. “Oh yeah, I bet you scream pretty too, don’t you, big man?”

“I can scream for you. I will scream for you. I promise I will,” Aaron stammered. “I’ll fight. I’ll scream. I’ll do anything you want.”

The unsub’s hands grasped Hotch’s knees, and Aaron let them slide apart. Dirty, bloody hands, hands dirty with Spencer Reid’s blood, reached for Aaron’s belt. Aaron couldn’t stare away and he couldn’t watch either. The unsub was drooling in anticipation, his slack jaw shaking with a guttural laugh. Aaron lifted his chin at the last moment, unable to watch as his belt came free and his trousers were undone. Cold air rushed across his abdomen, followed by evil, dirty fingers.

It was a good thing Hotch had glanced up. He yanked his face to the side in time to narrowly miss the nail-dotted board that came slashing across a mere inch from the end of the his nose in the most savage swing imaginable.

So tee-ball hadn’t been a complete waste of time for Spencer, had it?

The unsub wailed and grabbed for the back of his head, stumbling sideways. He cried out in pain as another strike connected, and another, and another. The blows rained down with unstoppable, inhuman wrath. The board slammed into his head, his skull, his face, his neck, his skull again as he twitched and spasmed and writhed in pain. The impacts became somewhat noisier, kind of slushy even. Hotch watched the board and the nails as they dropped over and over and over, impacting flesh and bone, coming back dripping with gore, falling again to rake more wounds. With each successive strike, it took longer to pull the corner of the board and the bent nails out of the slashes and punctures they were creating. Still more strikes impacted, and Hotch realized it was raining heavy bloody drops with fragments of skull and brain matter.

The unsub stopped moving. His left foot wiggled, thrashed, stopped. His chest rose. His chest fell. His chest was still.

The blood-soaked board with the bent, blood-coated nails fell to the basement floor. Hotch followed the long, naked, dirty, bloody legs upwards. Reid was heaving with exertion. It took a lot of physical strength to commit actual murder. Spencer stared at the unsub’s corpse, his features blank of all emotion save one – relief.

“Are you okay?” Reid trembled. “Aaron?”

Hotch nodded unevenly. Reid sagged back to the floor and crawled sobbing to the far corner. He balled up with his back to Hotch, and let out a howl of anguish as he rocked back and forth.

“Reid….?” Hotch whispered. “Spencer, come here. It’s okay. Honey....honey...come...come here.....” It hurt so bad not to be able to soothe the pain away, hurt even worse to hear Reid crying.

After a few minutes of utter despair, Reid stifled the sounds he was making, rubbing a blood-soaked hand back against his mouth and nose, struggling to get back to his feet. He searched the floor for a moment before he found his trousers, which had been shoved back against the wall an hour ago when all this evil had begun to transpire. Reid slid carefully and slowly back into his boxers and pants, then straightened his shirt tails and his tie. He pulled on his socks and then his shoes, and dried his face again.

“Have to get you loose,” Spencer whispered, collecting a few nails from the floor and approaching Aaron. He knelt beside him and put the twists of metal on the floor. He dried his face again, smearing blood and tears and sweat around.

Spencer stopped, and stared down into Hotch’s lap. He carefully grasped Hotch’s zipper and pulled it up, then folded his belt together and tucked it back where it belonged. He patted Aaron’s stomach so tenderly.

“All better,” Reid whispered.

Hotch stared at Reid’s blood-smeared features, and his empty eyes, and could not find the words that would help. He reached his head as far forward as his bound arms would allow, and rested his forehead against Reid’s shoulder.

“Thank you,” Aaron murmured.

“Love you,” Reid answered softly. Hotch pulled slightly away, watching the doctor’s face, his bloodied features as they both stared down at the dead body on the floor at their feet. Never had a declaration of affection been more unnecessary. _You killed a man to save my dignity. Of course you love me._

“Can you undo these?” Hotch asked, shaking his wrists. He wanted to be free, but he also needed to give Reid something to concentrate on besides the horrible act he had just been forced to commit to save both their lives. Reid gave a small nod, picking up the first nail and setting to work. When one nail would break, Reid would calmly reach for another. As he scratched and ground at the lock on Hotch’s left wrist, Spencer leaned against Hotch’s side and trembled.

"It may take a while,” Spencer stammered.

“That’s okay. It’s okay. It’ll be okay,” Hotch heard himself babble. He sat up straighter and slid his left leg carefully around Reid, guiding the younger agent closer. He wrapped his leg around Reid. “It’s going to be okay,” he promised, nudging his head between Reid’s upraised arms and nosing his cheek.

Reid nodded vaguely, nosing Hotch’s cheek in reply. “Love you,” he repeated in a child-like, soft voice.

“Love you more,” Aaron whispered back. Reid sniffled and smiled at him. Aaron’s left hand came free. He winced as he lowered it, rotated the stiff limb, cradled the raw skin against his chest for a moment. Then he lifted his hand and slid it gently around Reid’s waist, petting, soothing, stroking. 

Reid continued to work on Hotch’s right wrist. He flinched to the side and slipped unexpectedly. There was a pool of thick, red-black liquid intruding into their space. Reid shivered and retreated from the horrid spill.

Upstairs, a door banged open against the wall. Reid jumped and then huddled fearfully against Hotch. Hotch stroked Reid’s hair.

“It’s okay. It’s okay,” Aaron promised.

“FBI!!” Derek Morgan shouted. Feet stomped across the wooden floor. 

“HOTCH!?” “REID!?” Prentiss echoed. 

“HOTCH!?” Morgan called. 

“REID?!” Prentiss howled.

“BASEMENT!” Hotch screamed. It was like an obscene game of Marco Polo.

“Down here!” Reid called as he went back to work on Aaron’s wrist.

Morgan and Prentiss pounded down into the basement, flashlights bouncing beams across the scene. Hotch really wished they hadn’t brought light below – light didn’t belong in this place, this prison, this concave hollow of man-made hell.

Prentiss took a step back and inhaled sharply when she came face to face with them. She lowered her gun and turned towards the portal.

“MEDICS!” she screamed up the stairs. Morgan approached slowly, cautiously.

“You two all right?” Derek asked, knowing surely what the answer was already. He scanned his light over Hotch – covered in red rain but relatively unscathed – and then over Reid – who was splattered with brain matter and whose khaki slacks were beginning to grow red with blood between the legs.

“My God,” Emily whispered under her breath. 

“MEDICS!!” Morgan repeated more urgently.

Prentiss nudged the unsub’s corpse’s foot. It recoiled and shuddered, gave a groan. Reid flared up off of Hotch’s lap and snatched Emily’s gun from her. He emptied round after round into the creature on the floor. Whether it had been dead or alive before, the matter had now been finally decided. The weapon snapped, snapped, snapped as Reid continued to squeeze the trigger even after the bullets were gone. The basement now smelled of brimstone and blood, and echoed with the sound of gunfire.

Emily carefully removed her gun out of Reid’s hand, and folded him into her arms, turning him away from the monster on the floor. She walked him towards the stairs, casting a look back at Hotch before guiding Reid upwards towards the light of day.

“We’ll get you loose,” Morgan promised, patting Hotch’s shoulder.

“Make sure Reid is all right first,” Aaron begged. Prentiss had stopped halfway up the stairs.

“What is it?” she whispered to Reid, who was sitting down awkwardly on the steps.

" ‘m not leaving without Hotch,” Reid replied.

“Okay,” Emily agreed, turning back around. She looked expectantly at Morgan, who looked around the floor with his flashlight.

“Where are the unsub’s pants?” Derek asked. Hotch pointed, ashamed he hadn’t thought of that before. Morgan followed the direction Hotch had indicated, lifting the jeans from the ground. There was rattle and clank. Hotch sighed with relief. Morgan retrieved the key, and made quick work of releasing Hotch’s right wrist.

Hotch stumbled to his feet and rubbed his aching wrist. Morgan kept a strong hand at his back to hold him up as he moved slowly to the steps. Prentiss helped Reid to his feet. His damp bottom left a bloody imprint on the wooden stairs.

Hotch took one of Reid’s hands as they climbed the steps, and he didn’t let go, guiding Spencer towards the waiting ambulance, past the phalanx of cop cars and black SUVs and gathered personnel.


End file.
